Reflections of a tired soul: An origin story
by seaslip
Summary: Elisse has been working for BH for quite a while. One night he begins questioning everything Why is he doing this? How much time has passed? He doesnt know what he believes anymore Then he starts remembering how it all began
1. Chapter 1

The lights flickered on again.

Cold, yellow light brought life to the workshop

It was probably either really early or really late, Elisse wasn't sure and he didn't care.

How many hours had he been working? , The passage of time felt fake anyway

He could see the clock right above his head on the wall, ticking the day away.

Any mortal would have gone crazy if they weren't able to feel the passage of time

but, for a being like him, it just felt like seconds.

A mortal life time was meaningless to him, even if he wasn't the gigantic and nightmare inducing being he once was.

Now, he was reduced to creating technological clutches to help him with his "errands"

Somedays, he just looked at the ceiling and asked himself: Why?

Why was he still doing this?

Was it the thrill of freedom?

Of going around the universe and being able to see and experience more than anything he could ever dream of?

No.

That wasn't it.

He knew he wasn't truly free.

No matter what he did or how far he ran

His past would eventually catch him like it always had.

This wasn't even about working with Black Hat, he knew he could escape from him if he so wanted to

After all, he was replaceable.

He didn't hold any important category, he was simply: "the delivery guy"

And he liked the unimportance of his position because it allowed him an easy scape

He had somewhere to go to, he always had a backup plan if things went sour

Because he wasn't an idiot, he knew that he would probably get killed or locked away to rot or something else worse than death

Was he really that bad?

No, no he wasn't

Or at least that was what he told himself every night

He didn't need to sleep, but sometimes he did because he wanted to shut his brain off

With every passing day, every robbery and kilometer travelled

His job seemed easier.

But he couldn't shake that little voice in his head that told him what he was doing was wrong.

He still felt hatred for some of the villains he saw

His heart ached sometimes, when he heard screams coming from Flug´s laboratory.

He knew all of this was wrong, but his worries seemed to go duller and duller everyday

He didn't even need the money

What would he spend it on?

He didn't need to eat, He didn't replace his clothes very often and he didn't have many belongings of his own.

His motorcycle and headphones made all of his belongings.

Then what was it?

What keept pushing him to do all of this?

Boredom.

He was an inmortal being with nothing to do with all the time he had.

He had lived with a family at some point and still held them in his heart very dearly

But it didn't feel the void in his life.

He tried being a hitman, taking human lives far and wide for money

Feeling the blood in his hands and the adrenaline of the hunt

But even that became boring eventually

He had wandered endlessly

Until he found this dimension

He heard about Black Hat and all the terrible things he had done

The rumors picked on his curiosity and he decided to present for a work interview

The eldritch looked down onto the candidates, one by one, making fear appear in their faces and their bodies tremble

He talked about power

About control

And eventually during his speech he transformed into a horrible, putrid, disgusting monster

Everybody ran for their lives, except Elisse.

He wasn't impressed and he was hardly even shocked

Black hat smiled , a wicked, sharp, toothy grin

He was pleased with himself for scaring all those inferior beings away

There was only one left

The smile disappeared from his face, replaced with indifference

"Since you are the only one left, and I have better things to do with my time, you are hired"

He said, hardly even changing the tone of his voice and left, calling for Flug later to show the new employee their room.

Since this was someone who was going to work with them daily it made sense for Black Hat to allow him to live at his mansion.

Flug was getting really weird vives from the new employee

of course, he had done the research on all the candidates and Elisse was the only one of them that didn't had anything in his criminal records

He didn't found anything about him on the news or any kind of trace from where he had come from.

He didn't even know if this person was a human

And that was concerning.

They didn't exchange a word on the way to the room

Elisse wasn't too fond of the scientist either, he heard that Flug had a gigantic ego, bordering on megalomania.

"This, is your room"

He turned the lights on, revealing a fairly good sized room

"You are allowed to customize it however you want"

It was definitely going to need a redecoration

White, plain walls

An individual bed with plain black sheets

And a decent sized closet

It didn't have any windows, only vents

Those were the only things on the room.

"You are not allowed to leave unless you are told to or given permission.."

The scientist started reciting the terms of the contract, Elisse already knew them.

He began rambling about loyalty and other things that villains clearly didn't practice

Elisse was bored and didn't even try to pretend to be putting attention, but the scientist was so entertained with his discouse, he didn't seem to notice

Eventually, Elisse was left alone.


	2. Chapter 2

His work wasn't anything really complicated:

He had to deliver Flug´s inventions to customers, steal some artifacts from heroes or sometimes go in search for enchanted amulets and such from ancient temples, Do mundane task such as going to the store and buying things since the others were too absorbed into their tasks to be able to take time to do that, ect.

The catch? He had to travel to different parts of the universe for his deliveries and robberies

Sometimes, the job proved to be deadly.

Getting chased and almost eaten alive by monsters, losing an arm or a leg, having to kill someone who tried to stop him from accomplishing his job…

All of those were almost daily events.

While he didn't find the idea of killing appealing, and, tried not to whenever possible, sometimes there wasn't another option.

He didn't care much about how deadly his job was, after all, he knew he couldn't die even if he wanted to.

He had the time to get to know everyone working for Black Hat:

The cute lizard girl that was head over hills for the eldritch

The naggy megalomaniac scientist who did everything he could to make their interactions as uncomfortable as possible (not that Elisse helped much with that, anyway.)

The cute and cuddly bear who enjoyed to play fight with him and who Elisse tried to teach to sneak and do other predator stuff even if he knew the bear would fail do to his color and size.

And finally the monster himself, Black Hat.

Black Hat wasn't really, as… "insufferable" as Elisse imagined him to be.

They hadn't talk much besides work and an occasional attempt at scaring or intimidating him as he did with the rest of his crew

It didn't work quite as how the villain would have wanted it to.

The most fear he had even gotten out of Elisse was a little gasp when he startled him

And even then it didn't really last long.

But he didn't have much to complain about besides that

Elisse was efficient, pretty apathetic and antisocial, but efficient

And that's what he was searching for

Elisse didn't care what Black Hat did with whatever he stole most of the time

But, he did feel guilty some days, especially if there were any causalities caused by whatever they used.

He cared about killing innocent people

Not heroes, not villains, but innocent people.

He cared about their suffering, even if he didn't mind hurting a hero or even stealing from them

People who were already into that world were likely to suffer, regardless of what side they rooted for.

They were supposed to already know that, but the fear in some of their eyes and their cries of agony proved him wrong.

He tried not to get attached to anyone precisely for this reason.

Not that he cared for anyone on his or the opposite side

Except for a few, selected, exceptions to the rule

He cared for 5.0.5

He cared for Dementia and even talked to her from time to time

He cared about his "family" and tried to write to them as much as he was able

He still had feelings, as much as he tried to deny that to himself.

They all already knew how they would end up, and feelings were just going to make things more complicated than they already were.

His time off was mostly spent working on devices he created to compensate for his weaknesses

He had a seal on himself that prevented him from using any of his demon powers

But he had learned a lot to compensate for it

He had adapted and overcome this obstacle

He was smarter than he appeared but he didn't want to be seen as a threat

He had studied ancient Garufian magic, engineering, self-defense and knew how to use a multitude of weapons from his time as a hitman.

The rest of his time was spent searching for a particular hero.

Any data, trace or location that could let to him finding this particular hero

Nobody knew why exactly Elisse was so interested on searching for them

Vengeance perhaps?

Elisse refused to answer to his motive most of the time.

He had to play dumb most of the time to gloss over any kind of question he would get.

After all he was no novice in the art of pretending

He knew Flug has began to suspect him from day one but, the scientist, smart as he was had been known to get jealous and be overly dramatic any time Black Hat complimented other villains or was interested in them

He had a superiority complex that probably existed to compensate for a poor self steem.

Everyone misinterpreted or dismissed Flugs distrust of Elisse as jealousy much to the convenience of the demon

There was always tension present whenever they interacted

A silent battle of egos and prides that wasn't visible to anyone but themselves

Still, Elisse had the advantage of having his façade very well constructed.

He had always felt like he was in the pinnacle of what he had wanted to accomplish.

He had an stable job

He had a lot of resources thanks to working in a villains base

Time and pretty much creative freedom to create whatever he needed

But, the cost he was paying was very high.

If he wanted to play villain, he had to bare all the weight that allegiance meant to his conscience

Slowly, day by day he was getting more and more numb to everything happening around him

He knew that the organization had kidnapped innocent people and forced them to work for them

He also knew some of them were used as tests subjects for Flugs inventions

He knew that, while he liked Demencia a lot she was willing to harm or kill whoever if it meant getting Black Hat´s favor.

He knew that nothing he cared about hold any weight anymore.

His search was fruitless

He could never return to his family because they would be in danger

He couldn't do anything to help all the innocents in this mess if he wanted to keep his job

And he needed the job, at least until his research was done for

But what would he do when his objective was finished?

He didn't know if he could shake the villain title off even if he didn't really comit any big crimes

He didn't know if he could live without the rush of adrenaline he got from stealing and killing sometimes

And if he was out of the organization, he would surely not have any way to help anyone who fell on to this horrible void

He would never be a hero, even if sometimes his intentions and actions could be considered heroic, simply because he felt an enormous disgust for heroes.

He would never work for them because their view on justice was tainted and corrupt

If he needed to, he would create justice by his bare hands.


	3. Chapter 3

There was darkness, cold and silent.

Elisse could feel a shiver running down his spine as he walked through the corridor,

The air felt heavy on his lungs as his steps seemed to go slower and slower.

He had a bad feeling about this

It was far too early for him to be awake, the sun wasn't up yet

"M..mother?.." his words were barely a whisper.

He had heard her steps walking to the kitchen, he was sure of that.

As he approached the kitchen a horrible, putrid smell hitted his nose

Had something rotten?

Then as he walked closer he noticed the door was open.

He almost tripped on his feet

There was an open suitcase lying on the floor

Along with clothes, women clothes

Stained with something he couldn't see in the dark.

He tried not to trip over the fabric and continued walking

He almost jumped and screamed as he felt something cold hitting his feet.

He finally had reached the interior of the kitchen and what he saw…

He opened his mouth to scream but no sound came out

A hand grabbed him from behind

"It was just an accident"

He finally screamed.

A loud, terrified and long scream that made echo in his mind.

Elisse woke up.

He was sweating and panting

His heart beating as fast as it possibly could.

It was just a nightmare, one of many he had that week.

His eyes adjusted to the darkness of the room as he got out of bed

And walked to the switch to turn the lights on

He wasn't sure if it was day or night since he didn't use on sleeping much

and the concept of time was still hard to grasp, even after being in this dimension

for a long time.

After the lights were on, he walked to the bathroom to look at himself in the mirror.

His face was still the same, pale, almost greyish skin from the lack of sunlight

A pair of yellow eyes that had an unnatural glow to them highlighted by purple bags under them

And a wild mess of purple that stood proudly over his head.

He was still there, he was still alive.

After reassuring himself that he was ok and what he just had was

Indeed, a nightmare, he decided to take a bath.

With all that taken care of, he dressed up and walked out of his room

today, was a special day, he knew that Black Hat was going to be busy

there was an annual reunion of villains and even if he hated having to attend such events

he had to go because it was a good business opportunity.

Flug was going to be left in charge while he was gone

Who else could take care of his business in his absence?

Demencia was far too crazy and irresponsible, 5.0.5 was practically a child, and Elisse had absolutely no interest in taking Black Hats place even if it was for a short time

He would have been annoyed with the motion of Flug being in charge, because of their rivalry.

But, he was going to be busy doing deliveries that day, and probably, by the time he finished

Black Hat would have already finished with the event after causing some misery.

Everything was going to go as well as it could talking about that kind of situation

or at least that was what he thougth before arriving to the lab.

Black Hat was already gone, no surprise do to the time, but there was something odd

He could feel it, something wasn't right.

Flug was pressing keys on the big computer, quite frustrated as he looked angrily at the screen

orders in binary code were being thrown at the computer which didn't seem to cooperating.

But aside from the frustration and anger, Flug was really scared and anxious.

Not that it was new, but this was a different kind of fear, the kind of fear Black Hat made him feel sometimes.

"What are you doing?" asked elisse, the scientist almost jumped out of the chair

"What have I told you about knocking?" said Flug grabbing his chest as he could feel his heart beating too fast from the scare he got

"Its not my fault you are that easy to scare" said Elisse rolling his eyes, trying hard to contain his need to laugh

"Your deliveries were cancelled and will not be resumed until further notice" said the scientist as he accommodated back into the chair

"What?" Elisse questioned, surprised at the change on his schedule

"Some of those orders were cancelled anyway" Flug explained as he went back to pushing buttons and pressing keys

Elisse could notice something interesting on the screen.

There were some words that didn't make too much sense at first, until Elisse began to think about them.

Those were the titles of files from the main computer

it had suffered a cyber-attack last week, probably from a hero base.

"Then what am I supposed to do?" asked Elisse, not caring about how frustrated Flug seemed to be at the unresponsive computer.

"We had a lot of orders cancelled lately… could you check the addresses to where you had to deliver?" he was actually kind of curious about all that sudden change, especially since some of those orders where from well-known villains that confirmed they weren't going to be on the reunion.

"I guess" after all Elisse didn't have much to do anyway, all of his projects were finished and he seemed to not have a lot of work left to do

He walked out of the mansion and took out a tiny black box from his pocket, after pressing a few buttons it transformed into his motorcycle.

He drove off to the first location and was surprised when he saw it was being repaired

"Excuse me, Delivery for Death Skull" He said to the guard on the stall beside the porch

The guard called to ask if his boss ordered anything

"No, if you are the deliverer for Black Hat tell him that the order was cancelled, we called his secretary"

Elisse laughed a little at the egocentric scientist being called a secretary, Black Hat needed to hire one, definitely.

"No, I mean I just wanted to confirm this was the location" explained Elisse.

He drove to the next location and got a similar response

He wondered why those bases specifically were being repaired

He decided to try his luck and go to the darker streets to see if he could find someone who knew what was going on

After a while he eventually found a coffee shop

He was in for some time asking for information

Finally he found someone who seemed to know

"Those villains just retired a few days ago, they haven't made any public claims, but some of their employees were fired and they said that was the reason" explained the waitress.

"But...why? I mean its too sudden and its not like they owned any money.." if they owned money to Black Hat he would had probably already used some over the top method to collect his pay

And age didn't often play a factor since most villains weren't even human

"Nobody knows, there is a rumor that heroes are making deals with some of them

offering a lot to get them out of business" she didn't believe much in that theory either

"Is not like a proper villain to be making deals with heroes, besides, what could they even offer to buy them in that way?" this wasn't for money, he was sure of it.

It couldn't be because they wanted immunity either, could it?

"There have been rumors of the return of a hero, so sadistic, their own kind turned their backs onto them because their methods are… rather unethical.

The heroes must be growing desperate." The waitress laughed.

Heroes were always desperate, weren't they?

"Oh but they were already desperate enough to send kids to fight their battles, I doubt they can grow any more unethical than that" he despised heroes with every fiber of his being, and now he had another strong reason to do so

Didn't they always gloat about being completely moral?

Practices like killing and torture were largely frowned upon, and now they were reaching to a "hero" that had no morals, it was shameful in his opinion.

He played the waitress for the information he got

It wasn't much, but it had to do.

He drove back to the mansion, some hours had already passed.

He had driven for a long time, and wasted even more time waiting to get the information

Black Hat was already there and Flug had already fixed the computer

He heard something about them having found the location from where the attack was launched

Something about killing the people responsible.

He didn't care

He felt really tired all of a sudden

He decided the information could wait for when they finished their talk and decided to go back to his room.

He fell into a dreamless sleep that night, definitely, the best he had in a while.


End file.
